


Heartbeats

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: One Shot, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-18
Updated: 2008-06-18
Packaged: 2019-01-19 03:28:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12402135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: One-shot. There's something bothering Ginny, and she can't stop thinking about it. Alone with Harry in the snow... Something's sure to happen.A/N: The verses at the beginning and end of the fic are from the song 'Heartbeats' by Jose Gonzalez.





	Heartbeats

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

One night to be confused 

One night to speed up truth, 

We had a promise made 

Four hands and then away

One night of magic rush 

The start, a simple touch 

One night to push and scream 

And then relief.

XXX

Snow had begun to fall in the stone courtyard beneath Gryffindor Tower. Harry and Ginny’s footsteps thudded on the cobbled stones as he struggled to keep up with his friend. Scarves wrapped tightly around their necks, the wind lashed across their faces and the snow fell heavier, white specks against the night.

Harry raised his voice above the wind. “Are you coming to Hogsmeade tomorrow? Neville and Luna were—”

“Sorry, no—loads of work that I need to start,” Ginny said hurriedly, quickening her pace as Harry frowned and continued. 

“D’you want to come to the library and hang out now, then? It’s not late yet, and we haven’t really hung out in a while…” he said quietly, speeding up to meet her pace. He turned to face her, but she kept walking and did not meet his eye.

“No, I’m so tired—sorry, Harry—” she began, but Harry swiftly stepped around her and blocked her path. 

Before she could open her mouth to complain, Harry spoke.

“Why are you avoiding me?” he asked firmly, forcing her to meet his strong gaze. 

He did not understand the look in her normally bright brown eyes. Her face was guarded, with no visible emotion except impatience. She sighed and didn’t meet his eye.

“I’m not avoiding you.”

She stepped around him towards the stone door at the end of the courtyard. Snow was now falling around them thick and fast.

Harry caught up with her as they reached the shelter next to the castle door. His face and fingers were numb with cold, but he refused to leave Ginny alone. 

“You are, and to be honest, I miss you.”

Ginny bit her lip and swore under her breath. “Don’t say that,” she whispered, more to herself than to Harry. She turned and rested against the stone wall, wishing Harry would stop inquiring. This was her problem, not his.

Harry stared at her, confused. “What do you expect me to say? I do miss you—but that’s not the point—why won’t you look at me?” He searched her face for a clue, but there was no clue to be found. He sighed and leaned back against the pillar, not taking his eyes off her. He told himself he would not leave until she told him why she was acting so strange.

Ginny sighed and looked down, looked up, looked anywhere but at Harry. She spoke slowly, to be sure none of her words would slip and ruin everything. “I didn’t mean for this to happen—and I didn’t mean to get so obsessed with it, for it to affect me this way. You don’t know how much I hate it, how much I want it to stop. But I can’t…” she began, and she looked up at Harry. His eyes were wrought with concern and confusion, his eyebrows concentrated with genuine worry. God, how she wished they weren’t.

“Can’t stop what?” Harry asked quietly.

She took a deep breath, again choosing her words carefully.

“It’s trivial, pathetic, and hopeless. There’s so much more I could be worrying about. People are dying, the wizarding world is in turmoil, innocent people are losing their loved ones. Yet all I can think about is this. It’s suffocating me. I can’t talk about it, either.”

Harry frowned and moved closer to her, but Ginny shook her head and shied away from his closeness. He stepped backwards and took a deep breath, still searching her eyes.

“I’m sure you can… Whatever it is that’s bothering you can’t possibly be trivial or pathetic if it’s hurting you this much,” said Harry carefully.

Ginny sighed exasperatedly. “But that’s the thing—it is pathetic, it is trivial.”

Something dawned on Harry that he realized hadn’t even occurred to him. The thought made him feel slightly uncomfortable, but he didn’t know why. It was a perfectly reasonable reason for her to be so upset.

“Ginny, is it a guy who’s bothering you?”

She gave such a frustrated sigh that Harry knew he was right. 

“No!—God damnit, yes. Is it that obvious?” 

Harry smiled wryly. “Yeah, sort of, ‘cause only us guys could possibly piss you off so bad.”

Ginny tried not to grimace at his irony. She blocked out the fears in her mind and tried to ignore her stomach tying itself in knots at the pit of her gut. Her feet were planted to the ground, and she couldn’t look away from Harry. She sighed heavily and tried to continue.

“I fucking hate it. Normally I can gracefully rise above this shit, before it gets to this point, where I tear my hair out and can’t think of anything but him. Normally I can get over it. But this time, I can’t. I don’t think I even thought about Dean this much…”

Harry raised his eyebrows, surprised. “You mean it’s not Dean?”

She winced at his words, but willfully shook her head. God, how she wished it was. “So… you like him a lot, then?” said Harry carefully. 

Something began burning in his stomach, and he realized he felt contempt at the idea that Ginny might have feelings like another guy. Harry knew his reaction was outrageous and stupid, but he couldn’t shake the feeling. He’d felt like this once before when Dean had broken up with her, but he’d been able to bury the thoughts. But now, they were alone and talking about who she liked. Images suddenly flashed through his mind like a thread of film. Him laughing with her, him touching her, him kissing her. Harry wished these thoughts would stop—it was normal that she’d like someone.

Ginny closed her eyes and tried to forget that Harry was standing in front of her. It was impossible, of course—she could feel his body heat since they were standing so close together, and she could feel his emerald eyes on her. 

“Yes, I do. I shouldn’t, but I do…” she said quietly.

Harry shook himself from his indecent thoughts. “Why shouldn’t you?” “He doesn’t see me.”

Harry frowned and reverted his attention from his jealousy to her wellbeing. 

“That’s ridiculous. I’m sure he sees you—how could anybody not see you?”

Ginny shook her head wistfully, again marveling at the irony of the situation. “No, really. He has never seen me in that way. He knows me, and he trusts me, and I the same with him. In fact, I trust him with my life. But he doesn’t see me.”

She knew her words were risky. Harry generally knew which people she trusted immensely, and so would easily catch the hint. But she tried to push the fear out of her mind—if she were to lose him, she’d deserve it for her foolish thoughts.

Harry raised his eyebrows. He subconsciously took a step towards her as he considered her words, thinking of the guys that she trusted. Only her brothers and himself came to mind. On a regular day, the second option would have been utterly ridiculous. He felt selfish for wondering if it was him she was talking about, but he could not help but wonder.

Ginny wasn’t sure if she’d been imagining it, but she was sure Harry had moved closer towards her now. The space between them was heavy and almost electric. She didn’t speak, but merely silently searched his face. Never before had she been unable to read his eyes. They were concentrated and heavy, searching her own eyes for something she did not understand. He seemed to be looking up and down her body, his eyes lingering on the nape of her neck and on her lips. Ginny had never seen him look at a girl this way—so intensely and seriously.

Neither took any notice of the silence between them. It was heavy, but oddly calm. Snow continued to fall around the courtyard, and the water of the fountain tinkled serenely. She could smell his sweat and feel his warm breath on the side of her neck as Harry broke eye contact with her and looked down. 

It was then that she knew he had understood. She wanted him to pull away, to scream, to run. Anything but the silence that she realized hung over them like a heavy cloud. She was pressed against the stone wall behind her, only a few centimeters between her and Harry. They had never been this close to each other, thinking about each other. 

Possibilities and chances reeled in their minds.

Harry looked up and caught her eyes. There was a fire in his gaze this time, a determination. He swiftly closed the space between them before Ginny could say anything. He laced his fingers with hers in one hand, and placed his other palm against the wall behind Ginny’s shoulder.

Harry dipped his head sideways in line with hers as he whispered his words.

“He sees you.”

Ginny drew a sharp breath at his three words, but before she could react Harry softly touched his lips to hers. 

A shock of electricity seemed to jolt between them both, lighting the fiercest of fires. 

When she didn’t force him away, he kissed her with more strength and opened her mouth with his tongue. He kissed her rougher than he meant to for a first kiss, but he couldn’t help himself—it felt as though this was what he had been waiting for. This was what he needed.

She kissed him back with equal passion. She grew aware of his body pressed tightly against hers, separated only by a few layers of cloth. Harry pressed his hand against the crook of her neck, sending tremors down Ginny’s spine. He intimately held his other hand to her waist.

Ginny could have sworn that in this moment they shared the same heartbeats, and in this moment the same fire flared in the pit of their stomachs.

Harry had had fair practice when it came to kissing. He was very familiar with the desire to touch a girl. But not one of the girls he had dated and “gotten physical” with had triggered the simultaneous comfort and thrill he felt in this moment for Ginny. The way their bodies intertwined and their lips danced was almost eerie, as if they had been doing it for years. They connected and touched like real lovers, not like reckless teenagers seeking escape.

Their lips broke apart for a moment to breathe. Harry’s body burned with desire as he looked at her for a moment. It seemed strange that he wanted this girl so badly, yet it had only occurred to him now, after being friends with her for almost six years. 

They paused and looked at each other. To Ginny, Harry looked different. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but he seemed to look older and more mature. His hair was messy and standing on end, and his shirt accented the muscles in his chest and arms. His eyes held a bold fire within them as he held her gaze intensely.

Again, he drew back simply to look at her. He wasn’t smirking, wasn’t laughing, wasn’t even smiling. He was simply watching her, his curious green eyes sizing her up and down, through and through. She couldn’t tell if he was looking at her by means of perversion. He was looking at her so deeply, so unusual, it scared her.

“I’ve never done that before.”

Ginny frowned. He’d definitely kissed a girl before, judging from the way her lips still tingled and the way his hips were pressed to hers.

“Never done what?” she asked breathlessly, still barely able to summon the strength to speak after being kissed so fiercely.

“Never wanted to touch a girl so badly,” Harry said quietly. Smiling to himself, he lowered his head and softly touched his lips to her neck. He pressed his body closer to her as he heard the soft moan escape her lips at his touch.

“R – r – really?” Ginny stuttered, grateful that she was pressed so tightly between Harry and the wall, for fear that her legs might have collapsed.

Harry grinned and looked up. “Not the same way I want you now,”

Before all her senses were completely clouded, Ginny shook herself from the Harry-induced trance. This was too much too fast.

“Harry, wait. I mean, there was just kind of this moment—a hot, electric one at that—and then you kissed me like no one’s ever kissed me before, and now you’re looking at me like I’ve never seen you look at a girl before—and all this is fast, big, fantastic—but I have to ruin the moment with all my questions …and since you just kissed me and touched me everywhere and drove me insane, I’m pretty sure—well, I’m really fucking sure—that I really like you. I mean, really like you. Hell, that kiss… And then you said these big things, like how you want to touch me and—you know—do things… Which I really want to do as well, you know… And now you’re looking at me in this really scary way and I should stop talking right about now but I can’t because this is really big, and--”

Harry pressed a finger to her lips in mid-sentence, silencing her. He smiled and couldn’t help but chuckle at her sudden verbal diarrhea. He stepped back slightly to give her space and held her gaze seriously.

“I know,” he said quietly, looking at her hard. 

“I know this is big. It’s big because we’ve known each other for years. Believe it or not, I thought about all this before I kissed you. If I was looking for another girl to hang onto my arm and bat her eyelashes at me, I would have kissed someone else. There’s a difference—I know you. I know you, and I’ve chosen to kiss you. I’m sick of girls wanting to say they’ve been with the famous Harry Potter. That doesn’t mean anything to me. You know me just as I am, and maybe now we can be together… just as we are.”

Nerves pounded in Harry’s stomach as he waited for her to respond. 

She smiled slightly. “I’ve liked you for a while now,”

Harry grinned. “What made you like me all of a sudden?”

“Well, I always thought you were simply a twat when it came to girls, no offence. But then you were genuinely disgusted with the way that Dean treated me… I don’t know, since you took such good care of me you sort of accidentally swept my off my feet,”

Harry laughed and linked his arms protectively around Ginny’s waist.

“It’s going to take a while for me to get used to the idea that you’re my boyfriend, not just my brother’s best friend,” Ginny said wistfully into Harry’s chest.

He smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep reminding you.”

She pulled back to look up at him. “Seriously though, Harry—if this doesn’t work out, then I really don’t know what will happen…”

“We’ll make it work.”

Ginny nodded wordlessly. In his arms she felt incredibly safe—from here where she could smell him, breathe him, and still taste him on the tip of her tongue. 

Harry slung an arm around her shoulders, and they walked back to Gryffindor Tower hand in hand. He laced his hand with hers, the tips of her fingers still sparking fire on his skin at her touch.

XXX

Ten days of perfect tunes 

The colors red and blue 

We had a promise made 

We were in love

And you, you knew the hands of the devil 

And you, kept us awake with wolf teeth 

Sharing different heartbeats 

In one night. 


End file.
